


Common Law

by TheShinySword



Category: BanG Dream! (Anime), BanG Dream! Girl's Band Party! (Video Game)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff, Humor, happy valentine's day, kind of, sweet dorks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-02-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:21:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22724602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheShinySword/pseuds/TheShinySword
Summary: When Maya is invited to Kaoru's wedding, she begins to suspect she's the last to understand her relationship with Eve.
Relationships: Minor or Background Relationship(s), Seta Kaoru/Shirasagi Chisato, Wakamiya Eve/Yamato Maya
Comments: 10
Kudos: 123





	Common Law

**Author's Note:**

> Something short and hopefully sweet for Valentine's Day. Got it in just under the wire!

“Yes. The rumors you’ve found fluttering past your ears are true, Kaoru Seta is to be wed.”

Kaoru Seta, star of stage and subway billboard, underlined her announcement with a jab of her fork, sending a bit of cake flying off the end and past Maya Yamato’s ear.

“Congratulations, Kaoru-san.” Maya hadn’t heard a single rumor about Kaoru’s marital fortunes but she’d had some idea when Kaoru dramatically invited her out to coffee and catch up with a gold leaf hand written invitation. Some people never changed.

Kaoru swung out her leg in a dynamic—dramatic—arc to cross her legs. If everyone wasn’t watching the celebrity hanging out in the middle of the hipster coffee shop Maya was embarrassingly a regular at, they were now. Kaoru had always acted as if the world was watching her and now they actually were. “Let it ring through ye olde Tokyo, I have finally been tied down.”

She had actually been tied down by a certain former child star since she was sixteen but Maya was too polite to point that out. Maya waited for Kaoru to continue with a, hopefully, pleasant grin. It was relaxing talking to Kaoru—the actor was more than happy to carry on a conversation on her own.

“Of course, I must have you there at my side, my constant compatriot. It shall be a fleeting affair, only a mere four hundred or so guests, but the ceremony shall be magnificent.”

Maya’s eyebrows arched up, “You mean as your best man?”

“My best WooMan!” Kaoru mispronounced. “I cannot imagine entrusting the rings to another.”

“Huehehehehe,” Her old chuckle drawled out of her mouth as Maya’s chin sunk into her neck in pleased and flattered disbelief, “Me?”

Kaoru stabbed her fork into her chocolate cake and shoved the resulting giant bite into her mouth. “Why Maya,” she said, spewing bits of cake. “I need you there. And of course, your ever lovely Eve will be in my bride’s party.”

Maya flicked a bit of cake from her cheek. Wait, what did she call Eve?

“We’re going for an elegant rainbow of sorts in the wedding party. You and Eve should choose which color you’d prefer now before the others take all the pleasant ones and all that’s left is,” Kaoru shuddered, “mauve.”

“Hold on, Kaoru-san, I feel you’ve made a slight mistaken assumption.” There was always an inkling of logic to Kaoru’s ideas but Maya was sure she didn’t see it this time.

“It is only proper that you two match! Perhaps in a lovely shade of Chartreuse. Perchance Lime?”

Maya frowned, “But why do _we_ have to match?”

“Don’t you want to match your partner’s attire?”

“My partner?”

“Your paramour?”

“My… paramour?

“Your beloved? Your darling dear? Your lover from a different mother? Your Boo Bear?” When none of her euphemisms seemed to land Kaoru added with a bored sigh, “Your girlfriend. Honestly, you two have been together so long I suspect you’re married by common law now.”

Maya squirmed in her seat with a nervous tick, “Kaoru-san, Eve-san and I are roommates.”

Kaoru leaned across the table, gathering Maya’s hands with solemn gravitas, “My dear Maya.” She paused to breath deeply as if gathering her courage to go on with her well intentioned delusions. “It is the twenty first century, we no longer need such euphemisms. Rather…”

Maya felt her focus drift away as Kaoru began her one woman show. It was such a Kaoru thing to assume. There was no one in the world more romantic and more innocently assumptive. That was something Maya admired about her friend, the way she’d sewn her heart into her sleeves. Maya tried not be closed off to her feelings but she’d never been able to be _that_ emotionally open. But it led to some odd assumptions.

A common law marriage? Was that how other people saw them? Maya tried to remember exactly how it worked. Something about a length of cohabitation making an unmarried. couple functional, and legally, the same as a married one. Emphasis on couple. Eve and Maya weren’t involved like that. No secret passions, no pining hearts, they really were roommates. It’d started as a way to afford living in Tokyo and as time went on the idea of going home to an empty apartment instead of a home they shared never seemed appealing.

Besides, Maya had never really interested been in romance outside the abstract. Pastel*Palettes had had it’s share of romantic entanglements (external and internal) during their run and it just seemed so messy with pounding hearts and hurt feelings and uncomfortably public displays of affection. The drummer took pride in how she remaining steady as her friends hooked up and broke up and got back together again. Eve had once mentioned that a proper samurai must love a raven haired beauty but that never came up again and it was hard to tell just how serious Eve was sometimes. So the two of them were—

Eve was Maya’s default plus one. If she wasn’t already in Chisato’s bridal party, Maya would have brought her and vice versa. It was expected if one of them came, the other would too. Was it really so far a leap to assume they were—

THWACK!

Kaoru slammed their joined hands on the table as her monologue reached its climax. “And that is why I say DAMN the love that dare not speak its name, do we not deserve the love that SHOUTS from the rooftops!”

The cafe burst into applause. Several men whooped and at least four women were sobbing. Kaoru always did demand attention.

The actor relinquished Maya’s hand as she stood up to take an exaggerated bow once, twice and fourteen more times, “You’re all too kind.”

“Kaoru-san, you should workshop that into your next show,” Kaoru’s one act, one woman shows were the stuff of legends.

“You really think so?” Kaoru’s eyes lit up the way they only did when there was the promise of a new spotlight in her future. “Perhaps I could have a script commissioned. Yes, yes.” She stroked her chin. You would have to do the lighting, I won’t take ‘I’m a music producer with a full time job’ for an excuse!”

Maya smiled over her cup of coffee as Kaoru jumped onto the new tangent and away from questions that left an uncomfortable feeling in her stomach. It lasted until Maya’s lunch break was ten minutes past over and she finally tore herself away from her dear friend’s happiness.

* * *

There were four requirements to a common law marriage, Maya discovered while hurriedly searching the web in the breaks between the takes of the agency’s latest bubbly idol group’s new single. First, cohabitation. Maya and Eve had been living together for six years in the same apartment. Second, presenting as a married couple. According to Kaoru they did and the more Maya thought about it, the more she realized how often their friends assumed inviting one meant inviting the other. How many pairs of concert tickets had they gotten from Yukina? Eve didn’t even know Roselia’s singer and yet there was always one under Eve’s name. Maya was friendly with Tsugumi Hazawa but not “dinner every alternating Tuesday” friendly, yet she was always at the table with Eve.

Third, you both must have the legal right to marry. That ended the idea. Of course even a common law marriage needed the ability to get married. They were both women so that—

Well, they could always move to Shibuya.

**> Maya-san! What’s this?**

Maya’s phone burst from her hands as she fumbled it into the air with the arrival of Eve’s text. The sight of the text notification popping over the word ‘marriage’ startled her so badly her audio engineer asked if she needed to step out. Maya apologized profusely for her unbecoming behavior and stuck her phone back in her pocket.

It wasn’t until the day was done and Maya was on her train on the way home that Maya had a chance to look at what Eve had sent. Attached to the text was a picture of an odd little metal microphone. It was a cute dynamic microphone completely metal with a base splayed like a pair of kangaroo feet and two heavy adjustable knobs sticking out and begging to be turned. The head was uniquely hollow and visible over the metal bars it featured in lieu of a windscreen. It was in remarkably good condition. Maya’s audiophile heart jumped.

 **> An AIWA DM 14! ****Great Japanese maker!** **Probably about 6** **5** **years old?**

> **I found it buried in the studio closet. They were going to throw it out** **but I saved it!**

Maya smiled to herself, a rare happy face in a sea of grumpy, exhausted commuters. There was a part of her that considered telling Eve they didn’t need yet another piece of vintage audio equipment but that was a lie because Maya always needed another piece of vintage audio equipment. Their home was stuffed with the amps and microphones Maya grabbed from vintages shops or that Eve saved from the trash at her agency. Every corner that wasn’t covered in cables featured a piece of Japanese history: ukiyo-e prints, piles of old movies, and at least five katanas. Sometimes it held both, a samurai helmet over an old stand mic with black cables hanging down like hair, coiled cables hung on kimono stands and folding screens. It had become habit for Maya to pop into every antique store she passed in case there was something there Eve might like.

That was just the sort of thing one did for someone they loved. There was no question in Maya’s mind that she loved Eve.

The fourth requirement for a common law marriage: you both must want to be married.

What was the difference between loving Eve and being in love with Eve?

**> Thank you Eve-san.**

Maya hadn’t figured out the answer by the time she trudged up the steps to their apartment, nor did she know when she cracked open their door and called out into the warm glow of their home, “I’m back.”

Eve’s chipper response from within was instant. “Welcome home!”

Maya quickly navigated through the careful slurry of Eve and Maya’s interests piled around the walls to reach the kitchen where Eve hovered over the some sort of Finnish Japanese fusion on the stove that no one else would have ever thought to try. There had been many nights of miso and pickled herring soup before Eve finally found a way to combine her cultures.

Eve turned to Maya with her blue sky eyes and immediately stepped away from the stove. She smiled like a sunshine day and raised her arms out in front of her chest in a tight circle, like a sweet half-Finnish basketball hoop, “Maya-san!” She called out in her airy, but firm, voice. “Hug!”

Maya’s shoulders relaxed before she even ducked low and swooped into the comforting, tight squeeze of Eve’s arms. It was the solution for the only problem they’d ever had over all these years: Eve loved to hug and Maya didn’t care to be touched. Eve had had the idea when she saw Maya sneak off to squeeze behind a set of amps after a particularly stressful Pastel*Palette practice. What was a hug but a tight space to squeeze into? It took some getting used to but now it was Maya’s go to stress relief. The perfect solution for the two of them: Maya had a portable comfort place and Eve got to hug the person she loved the most—so the Fin had said.

A familiar warmth spread out from Maya’s heart to the rest of her chest. When someone fell in love, weren’t there supposed to be pounding heartbeats? Her heart wasn’t racing, it was the opposite. Her heart was so cozy and safe. Wasn’t there supposed to be a great struggle or problems or drama? Was it supposed to just be so… lovely? So soft and comfortable and home? But if Maya thought about it, and she never had before, the answer was so simple. It was Eve. Of course she loved Eve. It didn’t really matter if it wasn’t the same for them as it was for their friends.

As soon as she knew, Maya wanted to tell Eve. She always wanted to tell Eve first when she learned something knew. “Um!” Maya pushed gently on Eve’s chest until she relinquished her grip. “Eve-san.” Maya breathed deep.

Eve looked down with the stars in her eyes, “Maya-san?”

“I love you.”

“I love you too!”

“Um, well, I,” It was very embarrassing to hear out loud. The comfortable warmth from before was quickly turning into a volcano eruption on Maya face. “I’m _in love_ with you.”

“Me too!”

“Eh?”

“Of course I’m in love with you Maya-san!” Eve’s head tilted to the side with playful incredulity, “We’ve been in love for a long time!”

“Eh? H-hold on Eve-san. You knew?!” Everyone really did know before Maya.

“I simply assumed this was the long courtship of a traditional Japanese beauty and a noble samurai. I will immortalize our love in a poem worthy of the _Hyakkunin Isshu_ through many layers of nature metaphor and then we will have a single chaste kiss on our death beds!”

That was no good Eve-san. That was definitely, completely no good. “Eve-san! I don’t want to be immortalized in a _waka!_ And I would prefer to kiss you before we die!”

Now Eve finally looked bashful, “I-I suppose it may be within the bushido code to kiss _before_ we take our final breaths.”

Maya gathered Eve’s hands in her own, “I think it’s definitely acceptably bushido to kiss, Eve-san.”

Thankfully, Eve was the one who reached down. Maya’s poor heart had no more boldness in it. The kiss was salty—Eve had definitely added herring to the miso again—and Maya was too inexperienced to know if they were any good at it. But it was their home, it was where they were so obviously meant to be.

When they pulled away, blushing and giggling, Maya wondered, “how did you know I loved you before I did?”

Eve looked like a confused puppy, “You say ‘I love you’ all the time?”

Maya was pretty sure she had never said the words ‘I love you’ to anyone before five minutes ago. “What do you mean?”

Eve pulled her phone out of her pocket and opened the camera roll, “Look.” She scrolled down the saved photos. There were dozens, hundreds maybe, of photos of various bits of Japanese paraphernalia all dutifully saved and organized into albums. It took Maya a minute to realize that she had taken all those photos.

“Huehehe.” Maya took her own phone out of her pocket and looked at her own neatly labeled photo albums of audio equipment sent by Eve. “I guess I’m a little dense.”

“Maya-san! You’re my ideal Japanese beauty!”

And with those words and the passionate lips they spilled from Maya found, for the first time in her life, her heart throbbed.

**Author's Note:**

> I've never written these two before but I've said I wanted to for a very long time now. They're just so precious. I can't bear to hurt them and that limits my options.
> 
> You can follow me on twitter @theshinysword (18+ please)


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